How did the 2025 ICE raids affect school attendance and child welfare services in impacted communities?
Executive summary
Schools in communities hit by the 2025 ICE raids saw clear, measurable disruptions: Stanford research found daily absences rose about 22% in five Central Valley districts after raids [1] [2], and a national survey of high‑school principals reported 64% saw attendance drops and over 70% saw students express fear for family safety [3] [4]. Reporting and advocacy groups link those attendance declines to cascading child‑welfare and mental‑health strains — including increased bullying, loss of school‑based services, and emergency child‑care or CPS involvement in cases of parental detention [3] [5] [6].
1. Attendance fell — and the decline was large and localized
Multiple peer‑reviewed and investigative accounts show substantive spikes in absenteeism tied to raids. Stanford’s district‑level analysis found cumulative absentee rates rose about 22% across five Central Valley districts after spring raids, and the PNAS paper documented increases in student absences during the January–February 2025 raid surge [1] [7]. High‑profile local incidents produced single‑day drops as well: some districts reported day‑of drops in attendance of 20% or more and, in extreme classroom accounts, as many as two‑thirds temporarily absent [8] [9]. Nationally, a survey of over 600 high‑school principals documented widespread reports that attendance had declined among immigrant students (64% reported drops) and that communities experienced an overall “climate of distress” [3] [4].
2. School climate and safety: bullying, fear and emergency responses
Principals and reporters documented that fear spread beyond immediate victims of enforcement. The UCLA/UC Riverside survey found more than 70% of principals said students from immigrant families voiced concerns about their safety or their families’ safety; more than one in three principals reported bullying of immigrant students increased [4] [3]. Districts responded by creating contingency plans, safe‑passage programs and emergency transportation to reassure families — measures meant to blunt the chilling effect on attendance but which also underscore how schools were forced into crisis‑management roles [10] [3].
3. Child welfare systems and family separation pressures
Reporting and policy analyses show raids produced downstream child‑welfare demand. ICE and DHS materials describe welfare checks for unaccompanied minors and note that if caregivers cannot arrange custody, local Child Protective Services may take temporary custody — a formal pathway that can follow enforcement actions [11] [5]. Advocacy coverage and local reporting document families displacing children with relatives or leaving communities, and researchers note parental detention causes behavioral and welfare harms for children in the months after arrests [5] [1].
4. Mental‑health impacts and loss of school‑based services
Experts and local outlets warn that fear and trauma increased demand for counseling at the very moment many supports are hardest to access. California reporting and EdSource guidance highlight that school‑based mental‑health services are critical — students are far more likely to use them during the school year — and that summer or sudden dislocation leaves children isolated and at higher risk of worsening mental health [6] [12]. The LAUSD and other districts set up hotlines and clinics and expanded outreach as a direct response to raids [6] [10].
5. Economic and demographic ripple effects that affect schools
Beyond absences, enforcement produced enrollment declines and labor shocks that indirectly hurt schools. Local reporting from Los Angeles and national coverage show unexpected fall enrollment drops and community departures after concentrated enforcement; Stanford and other analysts tie such displacements to reduced attendance funding and lost newcomer students [9] [1]. Independent analyses of the raids’ economic fallout — from lost work to closed businesses — explain why families may withdraw children from school to avoid exposure or to relocate [13] [14].
6. Conflicting official narratives and reporting limits
Federal statements dispute that ICE targets schools and stress guidance that schools are “sensitive locations,” but DHS messaging has been contested by local officials and researchers documenting real attendance and welfare effects [15] [1]. Sources differ on scale: Border Patrol’s arrest tallies in some operations (e.g., claiming 78) contrast with observer or study estimates that place arrests much higher, complicating attribution of precise attendance effects to specific operations [1]. Available sources do not provide a comprehensive national tally linking every raid to attendance or CPS outcomes; most studies focus on particular districts or surveys [7] [1].
7. What the evidence implies for policy and practice
The combined reporting and studies show enforcement actions have immediate, measurable educational harms and predictable child‑welfare consequences: spikes in absences, increased bullying and trauma, greater demand on school mental‑health services, and instances where child‑welfare systems become involved after parental detention [1] [3] [5] [6]. Policymakers who portray schools as unaffected face contradictory district data and peer‑reviewed analyses; districts and advocates responded by creating contingency plans and legal and social supports for families [10] [16].
Limitations: these sources document strong local effects and representative principal surveys, but a unified national accounting of total children affected, or of the long‑term academic outcomes across all impacted districts, is not found in current reporting [7] [1].